Microsoft Corp. agreed to invest $240 million for a 1.6% stake in Facebook Inc. that values the social-networking site at $15 billion, beating Google Inc. in a closely watched contest. As part of the deal, the two companies expanded their existing advertising agreement. Microsoft, which previously handled Facebook’s U.S. ad sales, will now also sell the site’s international advertising.

Via WSJ.

“I don’t know what they all mean, but we do try to keep them from getting too weird,” he says. Levchin runs ads on his applications, but his thinking doesn’t stop there. “Our Top Friends app lets you buy drinks for your friends,” he explains. “So I think, What brand can be sponsoring one of our drinks?” He expects to make a million dollars by the end of the year on ad revenue alone. “Any big brands that want to simply drive traffic to their own Web sites are going to miss the chance to leverage the viral tools Facebook offers,” he says.

Fast Company

I really want one. In fact, it’d save me ~$40-50 per month. But I have Verizon and the coverage is amazing, bar-none. So I’m worried about the coverage of AT&T vs. Verizon. Plus, I can sync my phone (Treo 700p) up with Outlook and the Web access is pretty fast.

Anybody out there who made a similar switch? Talk to me. Por favor.

Anybody out there read Greenspan’s new book?